


I Don't Dance

by justbygrace



Series: Inspired by Songs [8]
Category: Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: Canon verse, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-09-18
Updated: 2016-09-18
Packaged: 2018-08-15 19:41:13
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 818
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8070163
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/justbygrace/pseuds/justbygrace
Summary: What's going through the Doctor's mind during that one scene in 'The Doctor Dances'.





	

**Author's Note:**

> "I don't dance, but here I am  
> Spinning you around and around in circles  
> It ain't my style, but I don't care  
> I'd do anything with you anywhere  
> Yes, you got me in the palm of your hand"  
> Lee Brice 'I Don't Dance' -- the most perfect Nine/Rose song ever

He was a lot of things. He was the Doctor, he was a Time Lord, he was the Destroyer of Worlds, the Oncoming Storm. He was a hero and a martyr. He was a sinner and a saint. He was a fighter and yes, he had been a lover. He had been there at the beginning and he was likely to be there at the end. He had faced off against and destroyed creatures that most beings couldn't even comprehend. And what was he doing right now? He was resonating concrete all because one tiny human girl was talking about things he didn't want to talk about.

He was as likely to resonate these concrete bars as he was to suddenly sprout wings and fly them both out of here, but it was something he could do, something he could concentrate on. Something that wasn't Rose nattering on about Jack as if he was the Alpha and Omega and he - the Doctor - was nothing but yesterday's news. Jack was a self-proclaimed con artist, a universal playboy, and generally bad news and Rose was sitting there with some goofy smile because the man had a moment of good sense and saved her life. And then she had to go and compare the two of them, bringing up pros and cons. And he didn't measure up.

Dating and dancing. The things that kept him up, that sent him beneath the console to do miniscule repairs for hours on end, the things that he wanted more than he had wanted anything in a very long time. The things he denied himself. And they were the things that she said made Jack better than him. He couldn't very well let that one go, couldn't just stand there while she suggested that the idiot who had essentially abandoned them to their deaths, could do things that he couldn't. 

So he told her that he danced. He had danced, both literally and figuratively. To get information, because it was the social thing to do, because he enjoyed it, for fun, occasionally in affection for his dance partner, once or twice for love. But admitting it to her felt like an admission of guilt and a weight off his shoulders all at once. She didn't believe him at first. Why should she? She only knew him like this - the war criminal, angry, guilty, prickly - didn't know he could be anything else. Didn't know he had started to want to be something else. 

Then the music was turned up and he knew what she wanted. He steeled himself, prepared to bunker down, to insult something and get her to realize he wasn't the right choice after all. And then there she was, holding out one delicate hand to him, asking him to break every rule he'd set for himself. He bluffed - blaming the bloody concrete once more, but she refused to be dissuaded, claiming Jack would retrieve them. 

The flash of her hand against the light caught his attention and the only reason he put away his sonic and came down there was because something about her story no longer made sense. It was why he grasped her hands in his, resolutely ignoring her sharp intake of breath, turning them this way and that, asking her about barrage balloons and ropes, all the while marveling in the delicacy of her skin, her web of nerves and bones, that fragile beat of life beneath his fingers. It had been so long since he'd allowed himself to touch, to look, to feel. 

She told him the story again, eyes darting between his face and his hands, obviously unsure about whatever he had decided to do, but utterly willing to play along. And then she had to go and bring up Jack again, calling him a Captain like he'd earned that title instead of the more likely scenario where he had bought it off some unfortunate soul. The emotions that had taken him off guard ever since she had arrived at the hospital with yet another pretty boy viciously swept through him again. She called him out on it of course, but her eyes were telling a different story. Her eyes suggested she was waiting for him to cut her off, to suddenly pull away, but he couldn't have pulled away for anything less than....being transported.

Standing there in Jack's Chula warship, he knew if the opportunity came up - if they survived the chaos that Jack had unleashed - he was going to make sure that Rose never doubted his dating and dancing abilities again. He was going to make absolutely certain that next time a pretty boy came along she wasn't even going to notice them, wasn't even going to blink. Because he was a lot of things - things that he couldn't even begin to describe - but all he really wanted to be was Rose Tyler's dance partner.


End file.
